Mobile communication systems rely on handoffs between base stations to accommodate movement of the wireless station (user) into and out of transmission range. It is, of course, desired that these handoffs be accomplished as smoothly as possible and standards exist to accomplish the handoff task in an orderly manner.
However, the effectiveness of the handoff is controlled in large measure on the knowledge of a base station with respect to the surrounding base stations. Existing systems “know” about their neighbors because the information may be programmed in at start-up and changed from time to time manually. The standard, however, does not specify how this knowledge is to be obtained. There can be situations where the base station which is attempting to make a handoff does not have the latest information on the surrounding base stations, thus causing, at least temporarily, some confusion which can result in a less than perfect handoff.
Further, problems exist in that even when a base station knows that a neighbor is present, it does not necessarily know the current status of the neighbor nor does it necessarily know the protocol, such as the modulation scheme, or the preferred frequencies or sub-frequencies, etc., that are currently being used. Knowing the latest protocol increases the efficiency of the attempted handoff.